Annual Blue Drop Awards now accepting Drupal site nominations

The annual, community-focused Blue Drop Drupal Awards season is underway, and is now accepting nominations for the 2014 Blue Drop Awards ceremony.

If you’re a developer or a designer, whether it’s your own personal website or someone else’s, any site can be nominated for a Blue Drop award.

According to an official statement from the Blue Drop selections committee, the awards aim to “publicly recognize the excellent individuals, companies, and projects that have pushed the limits and maximized the capabilities of Drupal.”

This year will mark the third year the Blue Drop Awards will be handed out, with the inaugural year of the awards being 2012. Anyone can nominate a Drupal site for consideration in the awards. Finalists will be selected by the Blue Drop Awards Nominating Committee, based on several considerations, including: Drupal innovation; use of Drupal best practices; content, structure, and navigation; visual design; functionality; and overall experience.

Nominations are now open, and can be made at the main 2014 Blue Drop Awards site here. “Drupal projects — and the people behind them — are to be nominated by the Drupal community,” the statement continues. There will be several weeks available for people to get their nominations in before the selections committee finalizes their choices. Open community voting will then begin on Monday, May 5, and continue until Monday, May 19.

This year, the winners of the awards will be announced Wednesday, June 4, at an awards ceremony at DrupalCon 2014 in Austin, Texas, which runs Monday through Friday, the week of June 2nd.

The Blue Drop Awards have expanded over the past three years to include 24 different categories. A full list of the available categories and awards can be found on the Blue Drop site here.

The list of available Drupal categories includes, but is not limited to:

• Best Drupal Website of the Year

• Best B2C Website

• Best B2B Website

• Best Government Website

• Best Health Care Website

• Best Education Website

• Best Marketplace / eCommerce Website

• Best Retail Website

• Best Entertainment Website

• And 15 more categories

If you are interested in helping the Blue Drop Awards, the organization is still accepting volunteers. Specific information about their volunteer needs can be found here.

The official statement went on to say, “The Blue Drop Awards were created to promote Drupal to the greater technology community and to recognize innovative, next-generation websites and the companies that built them.”